Croptoberfest mid-month update

It's the 22nd of October and I have already met my goal for 31 layouts this month for Personal Scrapper's Croptoberfest. As of last night, I'm up to 34 layouts. If you factor in double page layouts, I've actually completed 43 pages so far. I am still going to try to complete a layout a day just to see how many I can do this month. (Yes, I'm an overachiever!)

I actually completed this layout on the 9th. It would have been Mamma & Pappa's anniversary, so I planned to make a layout with one of their old photos. Instead I came across this photo of Grandma Smith and decided to scrap it. I was able to copy the photo the photo that my aunt Missy had. I pulled out my September Project kit from Scarlet Lime and used it with this photo. Although the project kit was Halloween-themed, everything on this layout except for the cardstock and alphabet stickers were in the kit. I traced another scalloped circle and hand cut this one so I would have the color I needed. This is one of my favorite pages.

On the 11th, Erica gave us a challenge to use scallops on our page. I used my new Marvy Uchida scalloped circle punch on "Tricked out!" I saw a layout by Shannon Zickel in Scrapbooks Etc. that had bats on a white background. I think she had used stickers, but I was reminded of some Heidi Swapp foam stamps (with bats) that I had gotten on clearance cheap earlier this year. Most everything else for this page was from the September Scarlet Lime Project Kit - that's where the glitter for the chipboard star came from!On the 12th, we were busy partying with family to celebrate Blake's birthday, but after everyone left, I found time to make one page. Kevin received a skateboard for his birthday LAST NOVEMBER and I was until this month finally getting pics of him on it. He plays with it all the time, but I just never seem to have my camera handy. I used scraps from the April Personal Scrapper kit to make this LO along with some other Fancy Pants products I had picked up at Archiver's.I stayed up late on Blake's birthday after everyone went to bed (I couldn't sleep!) and finished three layouts. They knocked out a couple of the October challenges from Leah at Personal Scrapper and all three used the new October kit, too.

"Shelling Corn" highlighted a fall tradition - the boys harvesting with Dad."Backseat Entertainment" mainly used up some scraps with a couple pictures that matched. The boys love using the new DVD player on roadtrips. (Here we were going to Evansville for Tom's birthday.) I loved that my new $1 set of Studio G wood mount alpha stamps matched the font in my Scenic Route stickers perfectly. Leah had a challenge to scrap your fall favorites. I pulled together pics from our trip to a pumpkin farm and also one of our fall display in our yard. Used scraps from the kit (made my own 'tags') and an assortment of alphabet tickers. On the 14th, I finished off Leah's final challenge for October. It was to create a month in review LO for September. Instead of using pictures, I decided to just list the highlights. Photos from everything will have their own pages at some point. I used the last little bit of the kit for this one. I also got back to work on our Florida vacation album. These are some pics from our last day there while we played in the pool after the rain finally stopped.

Erica challenged us to pull out an old PS kit for a LO. I found the July 2005 kit with scraps and was able to match up pics from Tom's birthday in '05 with it. I kept the LO simple and use the papers to make embellishments. It's a finished page...The final scraps of the kit sat on my desk for 4 days (I wasn't feeling well for a few days), but I used them up on this random shot of the boys in March '06. The title reflects their ages at the time. I added some naked chipboard. Since I finished off my October kit, I decided to pull out my barely touched October kit. I found these last day of school pics from '07 to work with it and Erica's "use 4 or more pics on a page" challenge for the day Monday. It's not my favorite layout, but it's done.For a past "sports page" challenge, I finally scrapped these pics of Blake with his basketball trophy from March '06. His trophy collection has more than tripled since then!Yesterday was all about me...I had a couple pics of souvenirs I brought home from our vacation this summer. Every day I sit at the computer with "my monkey" looking over the top of my monitor at me. I found the coconut bank at a roadside fruit/souvenir stand on the way home. I fell in love with it. I actually lifted a layout by blondegrrlie/Lindsey, since Erica had issued a scraplift challenge. I was able to use an assortment of scraps for this page.

Finally, last night I scrapped my new fall favorite. I can admit now that when I worked, I had an obsession with purses. I had way too many of them and spent way to much on them. When I started staying home, it seemed like all of my personal purchases came to a halt so I could prioritize (wink, wink) and purchase scrapbook supplies. While we were in Florida this summer, we found an outlet mall. My sisters were excited to find a Coach outlet. Although the purses were pretty, I wasn't impressed. Later we came across a Lucky outlet. My sisters were thrilled to find the expensive jeans half price. I wondered around the store while they were in the fitting rooms and fell in love with the Lucky bags they had. It had nothing to do with the Lucky brand - I just LOVED the leather bags. I finally broke down and spent $70 for this (all leather) multi-colored bag. It was regular $148! I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE it. So, I had to scrap it - right? I even scrapped the tags that came with it.

Have a great week!